Coal Scam case against Birla to be dropped by the CBI

India’s tope investigation bureau the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) said on Monday it would close a coal scam case against billionaire Kumar Mangalam Birla and a former top bureaucrat that surfaced in 2012 after a government auditor’s report.
The CBI will file a closure report on the case against Birla and former coal secretary P.C. Parakh very soon. The national auditor had alleged that the government’s under-priced sale of coal blocks may have cost the exchequer revenues of $33 billion, although industry watchers and the previous government had cast doubts on the figure. Indian media has dubbed the controversy as “coalgate”.
The CBI filed the case against Birla and Parakh late last year in relation to a block allocated in 2005 to Hindalco Industries (HALC.NS), part of the $40 billion Aditya Birla Group. Kumar Mangalam Birla is the chairman of the group.
The case had out the congress government in the spotlight as well as raised a furore over the case given Birla’s stature.